Poor Chekov (et al.). Just think of all the jaywalking and trespassing they did back in 20th century San Francisco! McCoy even impersonated a doctor (sort of)! And what about Gillian Taylor? Did she ever have parking tickets? Did she shoplift a chocolate bar when she was a little kid?

Damn, you're cruel to your characters.

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And I hear Kirk let some poor woman be hit a truck. Surely that qualifies as negligent homicide or something . . .

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Also, Kirk and Spock stole clothes, assaulted a police officer, Spock stole tools... At least McCoy losing his phaser didn't matter this time, since it was disintegrated along with the bum.

But it's totally McCoy's fault that all that milk and broken glass ended up on the street. I don't blame the bum for being scared and dropping it; how else would somebody feel when a raving lunatic suddenly appears out of thin air?

I never realized what a degenerate bunch of people my favorite crew is!

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And something worse happened, didn't it? They cancelled Star Trek and put on lost in Space or whatever.

^Well, technically I think Rasmussen was prosecuted for the crimes he committed in the 24th century, i.e. stealing a bunch of Starfleet equipment, trying to kidnap Data, and attempted erasure of the entire timeline.

What if you can't send them back? Keep in mind that in the "present day" Trek Lit world of approximately 2385ish or so, punishment is on a pretty nice penal colony. Gardens, exercise, fresh air, education and rehabilitation.

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Not always. Eddington was basically in an otherwise bare cell on a station somewhere.

By way of analogy, there are circumstances under which American citizens can be prosecuted for behavior abroad which is legal in the host country. The Foriegn Corrupt Practices act (business bribery) and sex tourism come to mind.

So it is likely that trhe Feederation could prosecute a citizen for crimes committed outside its territory.

There's also the reverse with the Federation refusing to allow one of it's citizens to be prosecuted for a crime committed on a planet that would not be a crime on a Federation world. (Justice - TNG). Wesley Crusher committed the crime and Picard refused to accept it. If you had a captain of a lesser moral code than Picard they could basically let the crew run wild wherever you liked. Rape, murder, theft? Not according to the captain.

Not quite. Picard refused to accept the sentence. I'm guessing that if the sentence had been for Wesley to spend a day or two doing community service (ie. fixing the flower bed infrastructure, planting flowers, pulling weeds, etc.), that would have been fine.

But that's not the penalty that the Edo specified for the crime Wesley committed. When Starfleet sets foot on an alien planet they should be under the laws of that planet. It's not like they were even invited. They simply showed up, beamed down and assumed that things worked the same there as they did in the Federation. The Edo are not human, regardless of appearances. They have their own culture and have the right to employ whatever laws they see fit on their world. The Edo were healthy, happy and apparently quite prosperous. Their system worked for them. By landing on their planet, Starfleet put themselves under the jurisdiction of the Edo. A first contact team is not an embassy. They do not enjoy diplomatic immunity.

But that's not the penalty that the Edo specified for the crime Wesley committed. When Starfleet sets foot on an alien planet they should be under the laws of that planet. It's not like they were even invited. They simply showed up, beamed down and assumed that things worked the same there as they did in the Federation.

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Tough luck. Regardless of whatever local laws are in place a Starfleet captain sitting in the command chair of an orbiting battleship wouldn't, for example let a ten-man away team be executed because they're wearing black in summer should that be deemed necessary by that planet's laws.

There are some universal constants, and crushing (pardon the pun) some flowers doesn't deserve death on whatever world you happen to be visiting.

But that's not the penalty that the Edo specified for the crime Wesley committed. When Starfleet sets foot on an alien planet they should be under the laws of that planet. It's not like they were even invited. They simply showed up, beamed down and assumed that things worked the same there as they did in the Federation. The Edo are not human, regardless of appearances. They have their own culture and have the right to employ whatever laws they see fit on their world. The Edo were healthy, happy and apparently quite prosperous. Their system worked for them. By landing on their planet, Starfleet put themselves under the jurisdiction of the Edo. A first contact team is not an embassy. They do not enjoy diplomatic immunity.

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And yet being tolerant of other cultures should also carry obligations on the part of the Edo -- among them, explaining possible consequences for lawbreaking and not being rigid and inflexible when cultural misunderstandings like the Wesley Crusher incident develop. The Edo were being, frankly, ethnocentric by not allowing for cultural misunderstandings and insisting on their own legal absolutism to apply to people who had not been forward of their laws and did not have the opportunity to negotiate legal agreements about the applicability of those laws towards them.

That's why it wasn't cultural imperialism for Picard to remove Wesley from Edo custody. It would have been such if he had removed Wesley to the Enterprise and then continued to allow Starfleet officers to stay on Rubicon III, and if he had used the power of his ship to enable those officers to do whatever they want and force their will upon the Edo. But he didn't. He took Wesley back aboard the Enterprise, and then he left Rubicon III. The Edo continue to have their own laws, and the Federation is no longer on their turf. That's fair.